


You Had Me At Meow

by cicelsticks



Category: SKAM (Spain)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, This is DUMB, joana makes friends with a cat, they have an apartment together, this is set in the future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-19
Updated: 2020-02-19
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:14:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22806922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cicelsticks/pseuds/cicelsticks
Summary: Joana and Cris adopt a cat
Relationships: Cris Soto/Joana Bianchi
Kudos: 49





	You Had Me At Meow

**Author's Note:**

> I just wanted to write cat themed fluff so this is 90% me projecting about how much i love cats  
> This is my first time writing these two, so I hope it's not too ooc!

Joana had always been more of a cat person.

When she was younger, she had a cat. A grumpy, black and white thing who had the soul of a curmudgeonly adventurer. He had hissed and grumbled at her parents, and they called him a menace, but they had loved him deep down. Joana had loved him more than anything, and he loved her to. She was the only person that he had let close; the only person that he ever sought affection from. When he had to be put down, she didn’t leave her room for a week.

Her family hadn’t had another pet since, but she would find the street cats and strays, and the pampered cats who wandered from their homes, and she would make their acquaintance.

She had been walking home from the metro on a Tuesday evening when she first saw the cat. A lanky tabby, who looked a little worse for wear, was lingering on the street outside of their home. She smiled, and crouched down to make herself look less intimidating as she called it over, making the usual silly noises to get its attention. The cat eyed her warily and clearly found her wanting as it strutted away, probably to scavenge or crawl back to its owner.

She didn’t think too much about it – after all, there were plenty of cats around their neighbourhood. She was sure that it was fine. Stray cats around here were survivors. When she thought back to that evening, she didn’t remember the cat more than she remembered Cris’s smile and their messy dinner (neither of them had learned to cook) and lying in each other’s’ arms.

The next time she saw it, it was raining.

She was hurrying home from work, trying fruitlessly to stay dry as it poured down. The cat looked forlorn, but there was still an edge to its gaze; the caution that comes from having lived on the streets. Joana felt a kinship with it, somehow.

She rummaged in her pockets for something – anything, really – to get the cat’s attention and finally coax it over. She came up empty, but suddenly remembered the chicken they had leftover from the night before. Mumbling a brief prayer that Cris wouldn’t be annoyed, she ran into their apartment, took the chicken, and returned.

The cat was watching her, and if it hadn’t been for its desperation, she thought that there might have been a hint of amusement in its eyes. As soon as Joana held the chicken out, the cat lost all of its pride and made its way slowly over. It definitely didn’t trust her, but it wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth either.

To Joana’s surprise, it ate the chicken out of her palm, and if she listened carefully, she could hear the low rumble of a purr. Her heart melted at it, just a little.

What surprised her even more was its relative docility as she swept it into her arms and brought it into their flat, shutting the door quickly behind her. The cat glared at her accusingly, but it was still purring beneath it all as it stood very still in the way that cats do when they are confused and displaced. ‘You can go back outside when it’s stopped raining, deal?’ She said. It sauntered off, heading straight for the windows.

When Cris came home, Joana had almost forgotten about the cat. Both Cris and the cat seemed equally surprised at the other’s appearance, both wearing comically startled faces. ‘Since when do we have a cat?’ Cris asked, looking pointedly at Joana.

Joana gave Cris her best puppy eyes. ‘It’s raining! I couldn’t just leave it out there. I think it’s a stray.’

‘Did you feed it?’ Cris was already in the fridge, heating up the leftovers for herself. She was always hungry after work

‘Just a bit of the chicken.’ Joana said.

Cris partially vanished into the fridge again, and Joana could hear the sounds of frantic rummaging. She yelled victoriously when she emerged with a slab of salmon that they had been saving for some kind of fruitless culinary experiment. ‘Perfect. Can cats eat raw fish or do we need to cook it first?’

Joana smiled, and shrugged. ‘Maybe we should cook it a bit, just in case?’

‘Knowing our cooking, we’ll probably poison it. Did you give it a name?’ Cris looked at the cat critically, who had been inching ever closer at the sounds and smell of food.

‘No. I don’t want to get too attached.’ Joana thought back to her precious cat, and the heart-wrenching pain she had felt at its death. Part of her was grateful that they had never had another pet. Sometimes, she felt too strongly. It was easy to make friends with street cats, and keep a safe distance. Letting something into her life that could so easily break her heart seemed foolish.

Then she looked at Cris, and Cris’s soft smile as she busied herself grilling the fish until she deemed it good enough for their new friend. Her heart was so soft, and so easily bruised. But she had been brave when she had let Cris in, and look at how that had turned out?

Obviously, the cat would run away at the first chance it got, but maybe one day they could think about getting a pet of their own. It felt like a big step, even though it was kind of a silly thing. After all, they had friends that were thinking about having their own children while they were swanning about. Taking it all minute by minute, just like Cris had said.

The cat was greedily munching on the fish as Cris dived into her own food, slapping Joana’s hand away as she tried to steal a bite. ‘Oh, so you’ll make food for a stray cat, but not for your girlfriend? I see how it is.’

Cris rolled her eyes, but smiled as moved the plate a little closer to Joana.

The rain was slowing down, and with it’s ending would come the ending of this moment. But in this minute, everything was perfect and soft, and Joana felt so easily loved.

The third time she saw the cat, it was six in the morning.

It had been over a week since it’s last appearance, and Joana had to admit, she had been concerned. She couldn’t help it – as much as she had promised herself not to, she was definitely becoming attached to this silly, greedy cat and she wouldn’t be able to forgive herself if anything had happened to it.

She blinked against the dark as she woke up, having been disturbed by a sound. Her heart pounded as she listened out, praying it wasn’t someone trying to break in. She lay as still as possible, Cris’s arm slung loosely over her waist. Of course, Cris hadn’t even twitched.

The sound came again, a soft tapping on the glass. She leaned up, carefully removing Cris’s arm as she looked out the window.

There it was, green eyes staring at her almost demandingly. She couldn’t help but laugh as she opened the window, letting the cat in. It placed itself on their bed like it did this every morning, and there was nothing unusual about it at all.

She should have been concerned about it, like the fact that it probably had fleas and who knows what else, and that it could be dangerous, but she was still tired. She pulled the window shut as she wrapped herself back up in the sheets. The cat blinked at her, and she blinked back, holding out her hand as she let it decide whether it wanted to accept the gesture. It reminded her of some kind of historical courting ritual.

The cat butted its head against her hand, and its fur was softer than she thought it would be. It purred happily and loudly as it kneading into the bed, settling down in the small gap between their bodies.

When she woke up again, the first thing she saw was the soft gaze of Cris’s eyes. The light coming in through their window was warm, perfectly illuminating the scene. The cat was curled up, content and safe, purring gently as Cris ran her hand absentmindedly through its fur. ‘I thought you said you didn’t want to get attached?’ Cris asked, her voice still thick with sleep.

Joana blinked. ‘It wanted to come back. I wanted to let it in.’

Cris smiled, and Joana had to kiss her, even as they both grimaced slightly at the morning breath. Cris’s hand stroked briefly through Joana’s hair before resting on the cat once more. ‘I think we’re going to have to give it a name.’

Joana pretended to think. ‘How about… The Marquise.’ She laughed at Cris’s predictable groan.

‘I should have guessed you’d bring it back to that fucking book.’ Cris gave the cat an assessing look. The cat stared at her, back. ‘She’s manipulative enough, though.’

‘I think we’re just easy targets,’ Joana said, lying in their bed and soaking up the moment. She stored up good memories like this, and saved them for bad days. Ones that felt so golden that she couldn’t twist them into something else. ‘I love you,’ she whispered.

‘I love you, too.’ Cris said back, kissing her again. After a second, she pulled back. ‘Wait, were you talking to me or the cat?’

‘Why not both?’ Joana laughed into their next kiss.

After that, she saw the cat most days. It didn’t always visit, at first, but whenever she decided to come by, they never refused her. And in the days, weeks, months after that first day, she never left again.


End file.
